


Vichy et les Résistants

by Florizel



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, M/M, Resistance, Revolution, World War II, vichy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-21
Updated: 2014-11-25
Packaged: 2017-12-20 22:43:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/892761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Florizel/pseuds/Florizel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Résistants were a group of people who opposed the Nazi occupation in Paris. Students, workers, unemployed people, also rich kids who knew nothing but longed for freedom. Due to unfortunate events, a street artist found himself involved with them and their causes. Hope leads into deception, and wine keeps it away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The dart that killed the artist

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfic in English! I’m an avid fan of history, and some months ago I was reading about the nazi ocupation in Paris, therefore the French Résistance. And the events reminded me of a revolution, then les Mis. And what did I do? Lots of research, then write a fanfic.  
> Thanks to the lovely May for being my beta reader.

  ** _R. 2-I-41_**

 Once he had signed the portrait, Grantaire handed it to the officials who had been his models for the last ten minutes. They smiled, visibly satisfied by the result, gave the artist two francs and disappeared downstreet, cheerfully rambling German words that sounded rude to French ears. The sky was darkening and streetlamps, punctual as usual, were already lightening the night.  It was time for the cafes to throw the drunkards out. _He_ was nowhere to be seen.

Grantaire reluctantly put the coins into his pocket.

The Aryans were supposed to be the perfect human form, but Grantaire didn’t like them even a little. Being a street artist he had no choice but plucking up his courage and keeping patient: the portraits and different drawings—oddly, the most popular were the cards with Hitler’s face on them, despite having a full set of provocatively posing ladies—the Nazis bought were his main daily earnings, barely enough to pay for his food and wine, also the rent for the hole he called home. What was the point of buying portraits of a face they saw everywhere? Even in Paris, the so-called “Guide of Masses” was pinned on every wall, on every newspaper. The little man was conquering Europe, just like Napoleon. Well, not exactly like Napoleon, with all the killings and concentration camps and deaths in general. And way more screaming. God, his voice was irritating, but his face was cash for Grantaire.

Actually, the task of drawing wasn’t too hard, he only had to nod, occasionally smile and draw what he was asked to. Easy money, he couldn’t afford luxuries but made a living of it. He could pay for a house, a closet-like house, unlike many other artists whom he shared the square with. He observed them, struggling to make the alleys a shelter, wrapped in his filthy blankets and protecting their canvases, as if they were their children.

What a naïve dreamer Grantaire was! How did he think his somehow good situation could last until the war was over? War hits everyone, some people receive more and some people receive less. The most affected are always proletarians and the poor and, unfortunately, Grantaire was ridiculously poor. But Grantaire wasn’t one of that people who clutched to the straw that was hope, who believe a Saviour will come out of the blue to wipe the bad in their heaven appliances if they behave well and apologize for their sins; or that a Man in Fancy Clothes and a Crown, settled down on an armchair while his belly grows bigger and bigger, would guide the people to a better state. There’s no God, there’s no King, there’s no Patria:  Grantaire didn’t believe in anything, and it was better like this. Hope leads into deception, and wine keeps it away.

He emptied his bottle at once, fixed his cap, lighted a cigarette and dismantled the easel. He descended through Rue Lamarck and left Montmartre, almost trotting.  The air was frozen, making his fingers stiffen around the wood of the easel.  The pavement was wet, even though it hadn’t rained. He didn’t see stars in the sky, there wasn’t anything but the smoke of his cigarette that vanished slowly. That winter was being especially hard, as if it wanted to complete the sad situation of Paris at the time.

That night, he decided, he would draw an extra amount of _führers_ and, only if the odds were on his favour, the earnings from the following day would be enough for a new pair of woollen gloves. And maybe a lil’ shot of absinthe at the Maine quarter, he was eager for a domino game and some oysters!

He laughed when the light of the candle in the centre of the room showed the reference picture he had of Hitler. It hanged on the wall, pinned to it next to his boxing gloves. He said hello to it. Was it possible to have a more ridiculous moustache? Or a more comical look? It was almost unbelievable for someone with such a funny appearance to be that terrible. Grantaire congratulated himself for his good aiming when he got the dart between Hitler’s brows.

It was later than Grantaire thought when he got home. He found the shops closed, and that meant one night more without dinner. Well, shit happens. At least he had his two little bottles of wine. Only a little gulp, he promised, to cheat hunger and warm his body. He uncorked the first bottle, and didn’t stop drinking until the second one was empty. The room spun around and around, he saw Hitler’s face, the boxing gloves, and the candle; then Hitler’s face again. “ _Goodbye, extra money, farewell, domino game_ ” thought Grantaire during his last lucid moments. At least he got warm, or it was the drunkenness that protected him from the cold.

When the night went by, Paris was covered in a blanket of snow.

Grantaire wasn’t woken up by the kicks that slammed the door down.

A pair of hands grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him until he opened his eyes.

Did he fall asleep in the streets? The nazi that was staring at him in contempt rolled his eyes. Did they wanted him to draw that early in the morning? He felt his stomach rambling.

“At last. I am afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave this place immediately, monsieur” said the nazi.

Grantaire opened his eyes, still sleepy, and looked around him. There was another one standing at the door, with his hand conveniently resting on the gun holster. The little fuck was smiling.

“Why? This is my home. I pay every month, I swear. Even if I don’t look like I do. You can ask the landlady. Why would you want this shithole? _”_

_“_ The Third Reich requires this location and you will leave it without saying a word _.”_

The nazi let him go and walked around the little free space, looking at Grantaire condescendingly. He took one of the bottles, smelled it, made a face and toyed with it. A subtle threat, Grantaire thought.

_“_ That’s nice, you speak French. For a moment I thought you learned that thing by heart, so you can say it to everybody you throw out. Do you want a Hitler card as a… _”_

He couldn’t finish the question, because the bottle impacted against his face. In half a second, blood was covering his face and staining his shirt, streaming from the nose. He looked up, shaking, and touched his face in a failed attempt to stop the bleeding. The cold expression on the nazis’ faces didn’t change a bit. Were they even human? The situation made no sense at all. Why his house? It wasn’t well located or anything…

“Don’t defy me, scum. Get out of here or…” Suddenly, he smiled. He had found something. “Oh. What is this?”

He was standing in front of the picture of Hitler.

Grantaire went pale.

There was no way to make it alive.

He corned himself against the wall, and slyly grabbed the remaining bottle.

“What is this?” The nazi repeated. His voice was calm, but Grantaire could feel the rage under his words. “This, monsieur, is a serious lack of respect towards our Führer.”

“That’s…that’s my reference photo.” Blood got in his mouth as he spoke. “I draw for a living. I have nothing against your…the Führer”

_Führer_ was such an ugly word _._

“An artist?” Asked the other one, still at the door. Grantaire nodded and pressed the bottle against his chest. “Hans, you know what’s said about artists. All of them but a few are raging communists. And they don’t like our duty, do they?”

Then he grinned and pulled out the gun, but he didn’t it point at Grantaire.

What a luck he had. He was going to kick the bucket without having had his absinthe, and hungry as hell. He repeated to himself again and again that it didn’t matter, that he had to die anyways and at the end his life wasn’t plenty at all. It was better to die with a bullet in his brains than starve or freeze. Goodbye, cruel world, have a nice day. He smirked, but deep down he was terrified. And his voice and body reflected this.

“No…sir.” It was the first time Grantaire addressed them respectfully. “I’m not a communist.”

Somehow he managed to collect himself and tackled the nazi holding the gun’s legs, and then smash the other one with the bottle. Taking the chance, he escaped the room and closed the door, running downstairs as fast as he could. He felt his heartbeat in the wound, his throat hurt because of the lack of breath and the cold. One wrong step made him stumble down the last stairs, crashing his body onto his arm. He felt the crack of a bone, but he couldn’t care less. Frantic steps and shouts were heard from upstairs, he knew the Nazis were coming. Grantaire got out the building and ran, ran without looking back, without a destination. He wasn’t wearing shoes. His socks were soaking wet, and frosted as well as the blood on his shirt. He ran desperately, blocking his nose. He didn’t want to leave a blood trail on the snow. Grantaire felt his strength was fading. He struggled to breath calmly, but the only could pant. He was choking.

Grantaire didn’t know how far he managed to get. He didn’t know where he fainted, nor if he would wake up anymore. He didn’t know if they had followed him. He didn’t know if they’d finish him off.

He let himself die against a mouldy wall of an alley of Saint-Michel.

 

 


	2. The lark and the thieves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cosette, Éponine and Montparnasse find Grantaire on the street.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Brigh for checking it!  
> I hope you enjoy it. Things are getting a lil better for R.  
> If you want to take a look, I edited Chapter One :)

Cosette walked holding her father’s arm. That morning, as she requested, they had left home earlier than usual, carrying lots of blankets, clothes and food, as well as a few francs for alms. Her heart broke when she saw all those poor people dying on the streets without a friend, starving children, men arrested without a reason; she had learnt from her father to be compassionate and generous towards the ones who had less than her. Since the prices for non-Germans had increased, people were hungrier than ever. Who gave them the right? They had their own land, and yet they seemed to enjoy starving the European population. Being wealthy, Cosette knew it was her duty to help the ones in need. But she couldn’t help but love fashion; she was after all your typical _parisienne_ young lady and, unlike Fauchelevent, she spent some money in tailor dresses or good brand hats.

The War kept her awake at night. Many nights she opened her eyes, startled, sweating, thinking Paris was being bombed. The rest of the nights she didn’t even manage to get to sleep, because the very moment her vision went black, the horrible events she had read in the newspapers or heard in the radio were recreated in her mind. The Dunkerque shootings echoed in her mind, and the black and white photos of piles of innocent bodies laying there, on the beaches and the paths, and the escape of the British…She couldn’t blame them for escaping, actually. Cosette also remembered the compassed steps of the Nazis, therefore that day of May when they _kindly_ installed themselves in Paris. The Gare de l’Est was crowded.

Surprisingly, most of the Parisian ladies welcomed those handsome Germans with a smile on their lips. What a present, statuesque lads who treated every French woman like she was a goddess! But Cosette loathed them; they abused of their authority and believed everything was theirs, women included: more than a few had invited her to _take a walk_ , or have a nice date at their _stolen_ flats in exchange of a reasonable price. It was humiliating. At least, she had the chance to politely decline the invitation. And, for some reason, Papa always got especially tense when they showed up. That made Cosette even more distrusting towards them. For the love of god, they were invaders with a fake smile!

Papa wanted to leave Paris, but Cosette wouldn’t permit it. Her life was there and she didn’t want to run away anymore.

And there was that boy…The one who helped an old gentleman at the greengrocer’s when he was about to get beaten, even knowing he would get crushed by the uniformed men for standing against them. Cosette had helped him with his swollen eye, but she didn’t have the chance to properly speak with him. There was something about that boy…

The sun had risen, but in didn’t look like it in Saint-Michel.

Cosette covered her mouth with her hands, horrified, when she saw that poor bloody mess of a lad, with his skin purple because of hypothermia.  At first sight, one couldn’t say if he was dead or alive. Cosette grabbed his father by the wrist and made him look.

“Papa, we must do something for him.  Please…”

Perhaps the Nazis did that to him. Perhaps he was like The Boy.

Fauchelevent nodded and entered the alley, followed by his daughter. He kneeled to the boy’s level and placed his palm beneath his nose to check his breath.

“He’s breathing. Weakly. But he’s alive.”  

Cosette sighed in relief and kneeled besides him. Papa kept examining the boy.

“The blood comes from the nose, doesn’t it? Those Germans…I’m sure they have something to do with this.”

“Shh, my child. We don’t want any tro…” Papa suddenly stopped talking and narrowed his eyes, looking at something in the distance. Cosette tilted her head, waiting for him to continue. He didn’t, so she wanted to see what was distracting his father, but he caught her face between his enormous hands. “Cosette, go fetch the doctor. The one who lives two streets away from our house, Doctor Chevalier, remember? Give him this and tell him to come as soon as possible.” He searched for a banknote in the double lining of his coat. “Hurry, Cosette, hurry up.”

“What’s wrong, Papa?” Asked Cosette, eyes full open. His father’s tone scared her.

“Please, do as I say.”

Cosette grabbed his hand, looking into his eyes.

“Be careful.”

She stood up and left. She saw in the corner of the eye how her father put some coins into the boy’s pocket and started walling in the opposite direction. It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened; in the market, going shopping, walking in the Luxemburg…In many other occasions they had to leave the place where they were, in a hurry, for some reason her father wouldn’t tell; he played dumb or made up an excuse. Cosette feared he was into one of those secret movements, those clandestine meetings in which the participants plotted against the Nazis. Everybody knew about their existence, everybody saw their posters, but nobody would mention them out loud.

Éponine glared at Cosette when she ran near her. Montparnasse shook his head and hugged Eponine’s waist. She escaped the embrace and sighed.  

“Ah, the things you do for love. We’ve been following those posh since dawn and, for what? Running into Javert and a poor dying bastard. When the cop is out we’ll see what he’s got.”

“I couldn’t get the address for Marius. I promised him…” Éponine mumbled more for her than for her companion, looking at the floor. He heard it anyways and clicked his tongue.

“You should forget that damned Pontmercy. Look at me; I’m waaay more elegant and beautiful than him. Why won’t you love me, ‘Ponine?”

“Shut up. You’re just another rat. Perfumed and pretty-faced, but still a rat.”

“Ah, a rat. You’re making me cry. And, tell me, what is he giving you in return? Because I guess you’ve asked for something. His Grandpa’s money?”

“I haven’t told him yet.” She grinned. “I’m going to ask him for a kiss. Be as envious as you want.”

Montparnasse sighed and rolled his eyes.

“This guy makes you more stupid than you usually are, my love. How long it’s been since you last ate? And you ask him for a kiss. Bah. Like he’s going to kiss you anyways, with that girl around.”

Éponine blatantly ignored him. Every day was the same. Parnasse was a good-looking fellow and he tried to dress well, the girls of Saint Michel were crazy around him, and he wouldn’t pick one and leave Éponine alone. And she had more than enough with Pontmercy getting on her nerves, thank you very much.

“Javert went chasing the old man. Let’s check the dead man’s pockets. Maybe I’ll be able to eat after all, eh? And you…you can get a new hat.” She laughed bitterly. “Nah, he won’t have that much money. Let’s go.”

Éponine rummaged in the lad’s clothes, with that sort of skill that only can be acquired by practice. In his trousers pockets she found a piece of charcoal, a ratty handkerchief and two francs. In the shirt one, five francs more and a piece of bent cardboard. It was his ration card, along with his identification and another sheet of paper.

“…Grantaire. Ever heard ‘bout him?”

She handed the card to him.

“Nope. But here’s a drawing of your lover’s friend.”

“Courfeyrac?” Montparnasse shrugged and showed her the drawing. “That’s Enjolras! Why does he have a drawing of Enjolras’s face?”

“How should I know? Shit, he’s opened his eyes. Let’s get outta here before he realises what’s happening.”

Montparnasse threw the drawing away and started running.

Éponine looked at Grantaire one last time before Montparnasse came back and dragged her away. If the poor bastard was lucky, the Thenardiers wouldn’t find him and take advantage of him as they did with the three refugees they were _taking care of_ at their house. Maybe she could tell Marius…Since Grantaire had Enjolras’s portrait, maybe he knew him as well. No, she couldn’t go to him without Cosette’s address. Once she had gotten rid of the rat, she would go to the Doctor’s, and maybe the girl would still be there. She would follow her home, write down her address, and that was it. Montparnasse kept the ration card, but she got the money, now hidden in her sock. On her way home, Éponine could get something to eat for her and her siblings.

The sun was high in the sky when Éponine got home with three potatoes. She couldn’t find the doctor or Cosette, so that day she wouldn’t go to Marius’s place. She sighed.

 Before entering her parents’ house, she pressed her ear to Marius and Courf’s apartment’s door. The only thing she could hear was the poet’s voice reciting something in a strange language, so she took for granted Marius was out to leave Jehan and Courfeyrac some privacy. She hoped they wouldn’t get caught doing any _perversion_ and, after being publicly humiliated, be sent to a camp. She hoped, as well, that her father didn’t notice their affair, for he was more than predisposed to collaborate with the Regime and alert them in order to get a few coins.

Speaking of the devil, his father’s head poked out the kitchen door when she finally stepped in. He gave her the liquid he was mixing with a little spoon.

“Hey, brat, give this to our new patient. Tell him it’s an aspirin, or morphine, or whatever. Make something up.”

“It’s water with sugar. He won’t believe it.”

Thenardier stared at her and frowned, so Éponine gave him the few potatoes she could buy and went to the living room before giving his father the chance to slapher. She shook her head when she saw Grantaire sitting on a chair, grabbing his wrist and not less pale than he was when she first saw him on the street. It was fucking called for. He was fully conscious and all the blood had been wiped away. She forced a smile when he looked at her. He had recognized her, for sure.

“Eh…Wow, this is awkward. I’m sorry. My brother and sister are hungry and…Well, that’s it.” She handed him the glass. “Take this medicine, it will ease the pain. It’s like you’re spending your money: as Gav says, it’s not charity.”

“The drawing. Where’s the drawing that I had inside my card?”

He looked desperate. Éponine raised her brows and left the glass on the table. He only cared about a drawing? Not his documentation or money? What a fool.

“...I don’t know. My friend threw it away. It wasn’t worth anything so…”

“In the snow.”

“Yeah…So you shouldn’t worry about it anymore. It’s probably torn, or wet. Hey, sorry about it.”

Éponine couldn’t help but pity the poor man. His expression couldn’t be sadder.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you don't hate me for this!


End file.
